Wow, I don't even know where to begin. There are so many different things I could write about. It's only been 4 full days that Veronica has been in my life but already everything has changed.
I'm completely in love with her, in a way I desperately hoped to be but was so afraid I wouldn't be. During the last couple of months of pregnancy I was quite fraught with the idea that I might not love my baby, or that the adjustment into loving her would be a lengthy one, filled with frustration and fear and self-doubt. The last couple of months have been so hard on me physically and emotionally and I was so afraid that the arrival of the baby would actually make things worse. I kept hoping that she would be the solution and am so relieved that she truly is.
I feel amazing. I'm sure I'm hopped up on a million hormones, but it feels incredible to not be pregnant anymore. I've already lost 20 pounds and my body just feels like a new place. I feel lighter and freer and just so much happier. It's truly wonderful. I love getting to hug Greg again without my belly in the way and I love the way he keeps telling me how beautiful and serene I seem.
And I just can't get enough of my daughter. She is so demanding, literally attached to me 23 hours a day, but I love it. I can't stop staring at her or running my fingers across her head and her cheeks, taking in her little sighs and grunts and fluttery breaths. It's so easy to love her, so easy to pick her up when she wants to be held, to change her yucky diapers and nurse her for what feels like the millionth time in the last few hours.
I know there will be ebbs and flows to all of this, that some weeks and days and nights will be much harder than others. But for now, I'm blissing out to it all and just trying to stay present to these early days. She will only be an infant this one time.
Greg is wonderful, of course. So attentive and helpful -- washing dishes and bringing me things when I'm stuck on the couch for an hour nursing. I wish he could hold her as much as I get to -- the moments when she's calmly awake and not wanting to nurse are few and far between right now. But I know that it won't be like this forever and there will come a day when all she wants is her daddy.
I'm also still processing the birth experience. Memories of it and different feelings about it arise through me throughout my days. It was really unlike anything I've ever done in my life. I'm so proud to have given birth the way that I did, so grateful that I got the experience I truly wanted -- birth doesn't always work out the way you hope it will -- but mine was truly everything I wanted it to be, and much, much more. I have a new understanding of my body and what it's capable of. I also have a new understanding of my psyche and what it's capable of as well -- the psychological reserves we carry within us in order to breech challenging situations are truly remarkable.
Okay....off to take a quick shower before she wakes up again. Please excuse any typos -- no time to proof read.
